{"id":10563,"date":"2026-03-09T00:03:42","date_gmt":"2026-03-09T05:03:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/?p=10563"},"modified":"2026-04-13T16:51:21","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T21:51:21","slug":"review-ray-naylers-where-the-axe-is-buried-offers-realistic-cautionary-tale-about-ais-oppression-and-resistance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/review-ray-naylers-where-the-axe-is-buried-offers-realistic-cautionary-tale-about-ais-oppression-and-resistance\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Ray Nayler\u2019s Where the Axe is Buried offers realistic cautionary tale about AIs, oppression and resistance"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Michael Grossberg<\/a><\/p>\n

Today, it seems like nearly everyone is caught up in either utopian dreams or dystopian nightmares about AI. It feels like it\u2019s almost gotten to the point where you can\u2019t pick up a science fiction story or watch SF on the large or small screens without coming across exaggerated scenarios projecting humanity\u2019s highest hopes or worst fears about what may be coming in artificial intelligence.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Where the Axe is Buried, <\/i>one of 14 works nominated for the next Prometheus Award for Best Novel, takes a more intelligent, balanced, nuanced and realistic view of such possibilities.<\/p>\n

Where all too often such AI-themed novels uncritically embrace one extreme or the other, Ray Nayler\u2019s post-apocalyptic utopian\/dystopian tale probes both scenarios from an anti-authoritarian, very human and humane perspective. His novel is notable for finding both extremes lacking from the standpoints of community, common decency and personal liberty.<\/p>\n

In a gripping but sobering narrative highlighting libertarian themes of resistance to tyranny and human endurance under oppression, Nayler ultimately rejects such wishful social engineering as an unattractive prescription for suffering and stagnation.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

An acclaimed Hugo- and Locus-winning author whose realism about international politics is rooted in long experience as a US Foreign Service Officer, Nayler has been widely praised for his subtle depictions of how ordinary people are affected – not always for the better, to put it mildly – by major technological and political changes.<\/p>\n

His latest novel, recently hailed on Locus magazine’s shortlist of the best novels of 2025, is an excellent example.<\/p>\n

Blending political intrigue, suspense, espionage and cybernetic SF, Where the Axe is Buried <\/i>probes the ups and downs of an against-the-odds revolution led by disparate dissidents while exposing the many forms of soft and hard tyranny that suffocate human freedom.<\/p>\n

EXPOSING THE EVERYDAY COSTS OF OPPRESSIVE GOVERNMENT
\n<\/b>
\nSet in the near future in and around Europe and Russia, Where the Axe is Buried <\/i>explores the fight and plight of people struggling under a wide range of oppressive governments.<\/p>\n

Some countries are suffering under routinely fascist\/socialist regimes, such as a Russia not that far beyond Putin\u2019s oligarchic dictatorship, but many others in Europe have adopted a new AI-led system dubbed \u201crationalisation.\u201d<\/p>\n

With advanced AI intelligences (known as Prime Ministers) set up as heads of state with wide support to \u201cdeconflict\u201d human needs,\u00a0 <\/span>the rationalized technocracies seem like relative improvements to many – at least, at first. After all, the AI Prime Ministers operate without the partisan rhetoric and over-the-top melodrama of much current politics, since the remaining human politicians agree to respect their decisions.<\/p>\n

Plus, Europe\u2019s rationalized administrations do seem more efficient and effective in addressing a variety of long-standing issues, from maintaining infrastructure and balancing budgets humanely to reducing human trafficking and taking steps to reduce or mitigate climate change.<\/p>\n

Yet, it becomes apparent that life for millions of people has not improved, but actually grown worse, under all the systems of coercion and control. As Nayler reveals in convincing granular detail, any authoritarian system is inhumane and deadening to the human spirit – regardless of whether it\u2019s administered by people or AI entities.<\/p>\n

A PEOPLE-LED MOVEMENT FOR FREEDOM
\n<\/b>
\nAmong the main characters one comes to care about is a brilliant woman who returns home from studies abroad\u00a0 <\/span>to help her ailing father, only to be detained in London by the authorities.<\/p>\n

Among the dissident characters is Zoya Alekseyevna Velikanova, the exiled author of The Forever Argument,<\/i> an anti-totalitarian manifesto that is smuggled throughout Europe like Russian samizdat to give hope to rebels.<\/p>\n

But it\u2019s a hope mixed with harsh reality that the book explicitly acknowledges: \u201cThere is no solution to disagreement\u2026. no technology that can overcome it, no leader that can repress it.”<\/p>\n

Even as the authoritarian systems persist, some dissidents prove inspiring.
\n\u201cIt\u2019s different here: We know what our government can do,\u201d one says.
\n\u201cAnd what they will keep doing, if we continue to let them,\u201d responds another.
\nHere Nayler is making an implicit call to arms, a plea for every one of us to take responsibility to resist evil and tyranny.<\/p>\n

As if the long-standing habits of dictators and egotistical rulers wasn\u2019t already threatening to override any remaining limitations on government as they change the rules to enhance their power and in some cases search for ways to indefinitely extend their rule, Nayler\u2019s well-conceived SF dystopia centers one more: an advanced but restricted technology permitting rulers to transfer their consciousness sequentially to fresh bodies when their current body gets too old.<\/p>\n

To his credit, Nayler offers no easy answers.<\/p>\n

Even though the Federation, one of the worst regimes, falls by novel\u2019s end, the politics and cultural subsoil remains that made authoritarianism not only possible but prevalent. Idealists, including libertarians, may wish for happy endings in both fiction and life, but the painful truth is that the price of freedom is eternal vigilance.<\/p>\n

Or, to put that classic libertarian wisdom in Nayler\u2019s terms, resistance and revolution may come with high costs and risks, with no guarantee of success, but it\u2019s a price that sincere advocates of a freer and better world must be willing to pay – and keep paying.<\/p>\n

CLARITY AND CONSISTENCY ABOUT UNLIMITED STATISM<\/b><\/p>\n

While some readers may take the novel to heart in short-term and partisan ways, Nayler\u2019s critique of statism and unlimited government runs deeper than anything superficially solvable by a mere rotation of one elected administration for another.<\/p>\n

The novel attains admirable clarity and consistency in its critique of all forms of authoritarianism, whether of the Left or Right and whether AI-led or human-led.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe thought of Palmer. Palmer, who now had to share the fear she had been brought up with, had to know that a government was not simply a thing to be annoyed at the insufficiencies of, an abstraction to accuse of incompetence, a frustrating source of inadequacy or neglect, but a thing to be feared. That it could reach out, even beyond its borders and destroy you.\u201d<\/p>\n

To his credit, Nayler understands that the roots of authoritarianism run deep. From a libertarian perspective, the roots go to the core of the State, defined by the great sociologist Max Weber as the only institution based on a \u201clegitimized monopoly on the use of force\u201d within a geographical area.<\/p>\n

Although Nayler may not go that far in his novel or in his own grasp of the nature of coercive government, his characters sense both the inherently regressive and coercive nature of the State and how broader human politics entrenches it:
\n\u201cOur human systems are trapped in these same extinct patterns. The tsar is dead. Long live the tsar.\u201d<\/p>\n

THE PURGATIVE POWER OF TRAGEDY<\/b><\/p>\n

Powerfully and poignantly but often disturbingly, the novel drives home the despair that all too many millions have experienced under statism and collectivism in all of its many forms and extremes of the Left and Right.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Like Orwell\u2019s Nineteen Eighty-Four,<\/i> an early Prometheus Hall of Fame inductee, and other great dystopian novels, Where the Axe is Buried<\/i> conjures a dark and disturbing vision. If that proves difficult for some readers to get through, imagine how much worse it is for the suffering characters – and the millions who in real life have suffered under tyranny, throughout history and around the world today.<\/p>\n

To me, vicariously experiencing such a dystopia is part of the author\u2019s intentions, and is equivalent to reading or watching any great tragedy. Whether envisioned by the ancient Greek playwrights, Shakespeare, Orwell or a first-rate contemporary writer like Nayler, such works ultimately aim to purge us of our relative comfort or blindness to such evils and inspire us to work for a better, freer world.<\/p>\n

Perhaps Where the Axe is Buried<\/i> approaches its mythic peaks when Nayler weaves in poetic interludes and apt stories. \u00a0A few evoke ancient folk tales retold, offering cautionary and anti-authoritarian lessons:
\n\u201cIn Byzantium, they would blind the fallen emperors, strand them on an island, exile them to a monastery. They would do everything they could to stop short of regicide. But it was never enough. Their very existence nagged. The strangling cord is the only way the tyrant can live in peace, then or now. This state grew within Byzantium\u2019s mold\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

A CAUTIOUS MEASURE OF HOPE
\n<\/b>
\nYet, ultimately, Nayler offers a measure of hope via a reaffirmation of our common humanity.<\/p>\n

Nayler shows no signs of being directly familiar with the wisdom or classic works of Friedrich Hayek, Adam Smith or Thomas Sowell about the resilience and initiative that people muster in free or freer societies and free or free-er markets. Yet, as a superb novelist with a profound appreciation of human nature, Nayler grasps the psychology, history and the everyday battles of human life – and thus eloquently dramatizes the small but manifold shoots of renewed life possible every day, even amidst adversity, via voluntarism, localism, community, and simple caring for one another.<\/p>\n

As Cory Doctorow, a three-time Prometheus Best Novel winner (Little Brother, Homeland), observed in his rave review: “Where the Axe is Buried<\/i>\u00a0shows how the embers of hope smolder long after they should have been extinguished, and how they are always ready to be kindled into a roaring, system-consuming wildfire.\u201d<\/p>\n

Near the end, after the AI-implemented regimes of \u201crationalization\u201d fall, one character expresses cautious optimism that there are \u201ca thousand different ways of living together being tried out.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s what actually happens in free or relatively free societies every day, beyond the scare headlines. And it\u2019s happening right now, something to recognize and find solace in – even though freedom always remains messy amid human fallibility, disagreements and conflicts.<\/p>\n

Even when a tyranny ends, the \u201cgood ways\u201d may not always or immediately emerge. Yet as that character and Nayler himself affirm, \u201cit could be.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Ray Nayler (Photo by Anna Kuznetsova, Creative Commons license)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

P.S. In a very personal and passionate afterword, Nayler writes about authoritarian trends in the world today – and expresses a poignant hope about his daughter:
\n\u201cI want her to live in a better world than the present one – a world where authoritarian government is the rarest aberration, and the future is something her generation thinks of with excitement and optimism, not dread.\u201d
\nIsn\u2019t that the hope of every adult, every libertarian and every parent, for their children and for the generations that will follow them?<\/p>\n

Note: For the full list of 14 current Best Novel nominees, read this recent Prometheus Blog news story.<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

ABOUT THE LFS AND THE PROMETHEUS AWARDS<\/b><\/p>\n

*\u00a0Join us!<\/b> To help sustain the Prometheus Awards and support a cultural and literary strategy to appreciate and honor freedom-loving fiction, \u00a0join<\/a> the Libertarian Futurist Society, a non-profit all-volunteer international association of freedom-loving sf\/fantasy fans.<\/p>\n

Libertarian futurists understand that culture matters. We believe that literature and the arts can be vital in envisioning a freer and better future. In some ways, culture can be even more influential and powerful than politics in the long run, by imagining better visions of the future incorporating peace, prosperity, progress, tolerance, justice, positive social change, and mutual respect for each other\u2019s rights, human dignity, individuality and peaceful choices.<\/p>\n

* Prometheus winners:\u00a0<\/b>For a full list of Prometheus winners, finalists and nominees \u2013 including in the annual Best Novel and Best Classic Fiction (Hall of Fame) categories and occasional Special Awards \u2013 visit the enhanced \u00a0Prometheus Awards page<\/a>\u00a0on the LFS website. This page includes convenient links to all published essay-reviews in our Appreciation series explaining why each of the 106 works that have won a Prometheus since 1979 fits the awards\u2019 distinctive dual focus on both quality and liberty.<\/p>\n

*\u00a0Watch videos of past Prometheus Awards ceremonies, Libertarian Futurist Society panel discussions with noted sf authors and leading libertarian writers, and other LFS programs on the Prometheus Blog\u2019s\u00a0Video page.<\/a><\/p>\n

* Read \u201cThe Libertarian History of Science Fiction,\u201d<\/a> an essay in the international magazine\u00a0Quillette<\/i>\u00a0that favorably highlights the Prometheus Awards, the Libertarian Futurist Society and the significant element of libertarian sf\/fantasy in the evolution of the modern genre.<\/p>\n

* Check out the Libertarian Futurist Society\u2019s Facebook page<\/a> for comments, updates and links to the latest Prometheus Blog posts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Michael Grossberg Today, it seems like nearly everyone is caught up in either utopian dreams or dystopian nightmares about AI. It feels like it\u2019s almost gotten to the point where you can\u2019t pick up a science fiction story or watch SF on the large or small screens without coming across exaggerated scenarios projecting humanity\u2019s … Continue reading Review: Ray Nayler\u2019s Where the Axe is Buried offers realistic cautionary tale about AIs, oppression and resistance<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2353,8],"tags":[1802,2266,581,814,2772,335],"class_list":["post-10563","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-book-reviews","category-review","tag-ai","tag-best-novel-nominee","tag-dystopia","tag-dystopian-literature","tag-ray-nayler","tag-utopia"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pe8nGl-2Kn","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10563","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10563"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10563\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10566,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10563\/revisions\/10566"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10563"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10563"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10563"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}